There's no such thing as painless

Democrats decry them, Republicans downplay them. One thing is certain, though: The longer the automatic spending cuts known as the sequester continue, the more they will be felt.

Democrats decry them, Republicans downplay them. One thing is certain, though: The longer the automatic spending cuts known as the sequester continue, the more they will be felt.The $85 billion in automatic federal spending cuts that went into effect March 1 may eventually hurt programs that help at-risk students, seniors and public lands here in the mountains, unless Congress acts to soften the blow.The president and congressional Democrats apparently thought the deep across-the-board spending cuts, half from defense and half from domestic programs, would be too unpalatable for Republicans to accept. But GOP lawmakers have rejected calls to raise taxes to help avert the cuts and are downplaying the harm they may cause.“In all, two years of budget debates have yielded laws to reduce deficits by nearly $4 trillion over 10 years, a point of pride for Republicans,” The Associated Press reports. “About $620 billion of that will come from tax hikes made inevitable by the “fiscal cliff” legislation, resolved on Jan. 1. The rest will come from spending cuts and savings on interest.”GOP strategist Mike McKenna thinks House Republicans took a smart, calculated risk by letting the sequester cuts take place. “Most people don’t interact with the federal government a lot,” he said.That may be so, but there is no way cuts this deep won’t affect people and the economy. On the military side, Army and Air Force operations in North Carolina will lose $141 million, and 22,000 civilian DOD employees will be furloughed, the White House says.In the Senate Appropriations Committee, Chairwoman Barbara Mikulski, D-Maryland, and Vice Chairman Richard Shelby, R-Alabama, were working last week on a measure to avert a government shutdown that could help ease the impact of sequestration, Reuters reported. It would allow all federal departments to transfer funds between budget accounts and programs. This seems to be a common-sense move toward making government more efficient while cutting the deficit and easing the pain of sequestration.According to the White House, the sequester will cost North Carolina about $2.4 million for primary and secondary education this year, putting about 350 teachers and aides at risk, plus another $16.8 million in funds for educating children with disabilities. Education officials are bracing for cuts from 8 to 12 percent when the new fiscal year starts in July.Henderson County schools received about $10.8 million in federal funding this fiscal year. However, counting the end of a one-time allocation of federal “Race to the Top” funds, the county could lose $873,000 to $970,000 next fiscal year, Finance Director Kerry Shannon says. More than a third of the federal funds the county gets, roughly $3.8 million, go to help at-risk, disadvantaged students.The Council on Aging of Henderson County is concerned about the loss of $1.54 million statewide that pays for meals for seniors, but at this point has no idea how deeply the cuts will hurt the local Meals on Wheels program. The council received about $300,000 in federal block grant monies this year, 71 percent of which funds Meals on Wheels, a program serving 215 homebound seniors each day in the county. The rest goes to serve meals to the elderly at the Sammy Williams Center on North Justice Street. The agency anticipates it will either have to ask the community to fill the gaps or prioritize who will receive services and who will go on a waiting list until funding is restored.

The Henderson County Department of Public Health is unsure at this point of the impact of the cuts on programs such as the Women, Infants and Children program, which supplements nutrition for low-income moms and children. Pardee Hospital, meanwhile, expects to lose about $90,000 every month the cuts are in effect.It’s true, many of these cuts may take time to be felt or may yet be avoided. But whether you view the cuts as indiscriminate stupidity or the price of beginning to cut the federal deficit, they will have an impact. Congress should act to give government agencies all the flexibility they need to meet the challenge.